One cannot launch a new history the idea is altogether unthinkable; there would not be the continuity and tradition. Tradition cannot be contrived or learned. In its absence one has, at the best, not history but progress the mechanical movement of a clock hand, not the sacred succession of interlinked events.

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About Osip Mandelstam

Osip Mandelstam was a 19th-century Russian and soviet poet. Osip Emilyevich Mandelstam was a Russian and Soviet poet. He was one of the foremost members of the Acmeist school. Read more on Wikipedia →

Themes

  • History — Lessons from the past and the arc of human civilisation

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